On August 7, 1987, the Central American Presidents
signed a peace agreement in Guatemala City which, if implemented,
could have a significant impact in the region.1
The agreement does not address the causes of the violence and
suffering that plague these long-term U.S. dependencies, but it might
restrict U.S. intervention, a prerequisite to any constructive change.
The circumstances of the accords should be carefully studied by those
who hope to influence state policy, but I will defer this crucial
topic, keeping here to the prospects for implementation of the
accords.

In approaching this question, we must bear in mind that we live in
the Age of Orwell, in which every term has two meanings: its literal
meaning, largely irrelevant in practice, and the operative meaning,
devised in the interests of established power. Accordingly, there are
two versions of the accords to consider: the actual text, and the
radically different Washington version.

We therefore face two questions: (1) Can the accords be implemented
in terms of their actual content? (2) Can they be implemented
according to the Washington version? The first of these questions is
only an academic exercise, but it is illuminating to consider it
nonetheless.

The Irrelevant Facts

Keeping to the actual substance of the accords, there is no
possibility that they can be implemented, as a review of the initial
three-month period clearly demonstrates.

The accords identify one factor as "an indispensable element to
achieving a stable and lasting peace in the region," namely,
termination of any form of aid "to irregular forces or insurgent
movements" on the part of "regional or extraregional" governments. As
a corollary, the Central American governments agree to deny their
territory to any such groups. This demand is directed at the United
States and the client states it has used for the attack against
Nicaragua by what contra lobbyists candidly describe in internal
documents as a "proxy force," organized, trained, supplied and
controlled by the CIA.

This central feature of the accords is redundant, since such
actions are barred by a higher authority: by international law and
treaty, hence by the supreme law of the land under the U.S.
Constitution, which we are enjoined to celebrate this year. The fact
was underscored by the World Court in June 1986 as it condemned the
United States for its "unlawful use of force" against Nicaragua and
called upon it to desist from these crimes. Congress responded by
voting $100 million of aid and freeing the CIA to direct the attack
and to use its own funds on an unknown scale. The U.S. vetoed a UN
Security Council resolution calling on all states to observe
international law and voted against a General Assembly resolution to
the same effect, joined by Israel and El Salvador. On Nov. 12, 1987,
the General Assembly again called for "full and immediate compliance"
with the World Court decision. This time only Israel joined with the
U.S. in opposing adherence to international law, another blow to the
Central American accords, unreported by the national press as usual.

The media had dismissed the World Court as a "hostile forum" whose
decisions are irrelevant, while liberal advocates of world order
explained that the U.S. must disregard the Court decision. With this
reaction, U.S. elites clearly articulate their self-image: the United
States is a lawless terrorist state, which stands above the law and is
entitled to undertake violence, as it chooses, in support of its
objectives. The reaction to the "indispensable element" of the Central
America accords merely reiterated that conviction.

To ensure that the accords would be undermined, the U.S. at once
directed its proxy forces to escalate military actions, also
increasing the regular supply flights that are required to keep them
in the field. These had passed the level of one a day in the preceding
months in support of the "spring offensive," designed to achieve
sufficient levels of terror and disruption to impress Congress. The
proxy army followed Washington orders to attack "soft targets" such as
farm cooperatives and health clinics instead of "trying to duke it out
with the Sandinistas directly," as explained by General John Galvin,
commander of the U.S. Southern Command, who added that with these
tactics, aimed at civilians lacking means of defense against armed
terrorist bands, prospects for the contras should improve. The State
Department officially authorized such attacks, with the support of
media doves. There are other terrorist states, but to my knowledge,
the United States is alone today in officially endorsing
international terrorism. We see here another illustration of the
self-image of U.S. elites: in a terrorist culture, all that counts is
the success of violence. Accordingly, debate in Congress and the media
focused on the question of whether the violence could succeed, with
"doves" arguing that the proxy army was inept and hawks replying that
it must be given more time and aid to prove itself as a successful
terrorist force -- putting euphemisms aside.

CIA-directed supply flights into Nicaragua doubled by mid-September
according to the Los Angeles Times, while Nicaraguan
sources that have been accurate in the past, though ignored, alleged
that violations of Nicaraguan airspace rose from 70 in September to
110 in October, most of them supply flights, particularly in areas
where the government had declared a unilateral cease-fire.2
Before the OAS, President Ortega reported 140 supply flights during
the three-month initial phase of the accords, an estimate dismissed as
far too low by contra commander Adolfo Calero, who said that "his
radar is not working very well."3
A review of the major media reveals only a few phrases alluding to
these matters,4
a highly illuminating fact. Of these few references, some reveal
editorial adjustments in a further service to state violence; thus the
New York Times, which suppressed this crucial issue
throughout the three-month period, did cite the statements by Ortega
and Calero on Nov. 12, but where they each spoke of supply flights,
the Times news report downgraded the reference to
"surveillance flights," still a violation of international law and the
agreements, but a much less serious one, and thus less unacceptable in
the newspaper of record.5

"Western military analysts say the contras have been stashing tons
of newly airdropped weapons lately while trying to avoid heavy
combat," the Los Angeles Times reported in October.
"Meanwhile, they have stepped up attacks on easy government targets
like the La Patriota farm cooperative...where several militiamen, an
elderly woman and her year-old grandson died in a pre-dawn shelling."6
To select virtually at random from the many cases deemed unworthy of
notice, on Nov. 21, 150 contras attacked two villages in the southern
province of Rio San Juan with 88mm mortars and rocket-propelled
grenades, killing six children and six adults and injuring 30 others,
wire services reported, citing Nicaraguan radio. Even cooperatives of
religious pacifists who refuse to bear arms are destroyed by the U.S.
terrorist forces.7
In a November report on human rights abuses in Nicaragua, barely noted
in the 42nd paragraph of a report on contra successes in the New
York Times, Americas Watch described the contras as an "outlaw
force" whose continuing abuse of human rights means that "we see no
way for compliance with the Arias plan's requirement for respect for
human rights other than the dissolution of the contras and an end to
all aid for them by the United States, Honduras and all others" -- the
"indispensable element" for peace and an obligation under the
irrelevant rule of law.8

The U.S. also launched further war games in Honduras, Operation
"Blazing Trail 1987," barely noted in the media. Nicaragua's protest
described them as the "biggest-ever military maneuvers in Honduran
territory," adding that "we can't see this in any way as a
contribution to peace" -- something of an understatement.9

Shortly after the accords were signed, the CIA offered
$3000-a-month bribes to 14 Miskito Indian leaders to induce them to
maintain the military conflict. The spokesman for the Indian
opposition described this as "a last-ditch U.S. attempt to undercut
their plan to pursue a negotiated settlement with the Sandinistas,"
UPI reported, adding that U.S. intelligence officials "have stressed
what they call the strategic importance of retaining Indian
participation in the war to help gain international support," the
usual cynical exploitation of indigenous peoples. U.S. government
officials quoted in the Mexican press report that the CIA salaries
come from a secret account "for political projects," unrelated to the
$100 million in congressional funding.10
The going rate is considerably higher for the wealthy businessmen who
serve as CIA democrats-for-hire, for example, Alfonso Robelo, who
receives $10,000 monthly tax-free, or Arturo Cruz, whose secret
$7000-a-month subsidy was transferred from the CIA to Oliver North's
account for fear that Congress would expose his illegal lobbying and
the fraud he perpetrated as a paid U.S. agent in connection with the
campaign to disrupt the unwanted Nicaraguan elections of 1984 --
elections that did not take place according to the media, which
regularly contrast the "elected presidents" of the U.S. client states
with the Nicaraguan dictator Ortega, who was not "elected" according
to official doctrine.

Undersecretary of State Elliott Abrams conducted a news conference
by radio in the Central American capitals on Oct. 22, unreported in
the national press, at which he announced that the United States will
"never accept a Soviet satellite in Central America" -- meaning a
country that is not a loyal U.S. satellite -- and that "We're going to
continue the aid to the resistance," to be sure, in violation of the
"indispensable element" for peace. The Reagan administration announced
its intention to seek congressional backing for its war, and Congress
obliged by providing "humanitarian" aid -- meaning, any form of aid
that the government chooses to send -- in direct violation of the
accords. Secretary of State George Shultz informed the OAS that the
U.S. would persist in the unlawful use of force by its "resistance
fighters" until a "free Nicaragua" is established by Washington
standards, thus consigning the accords to oblivion, along with
international law. This announcement was noted in a 140-word item in
the Times stressing Washington's intent to give the
accords "every chance," while a headline in the liberal Boston
Globe reported approvingly that the U.S. is "easing stance."11

While the media and Congress took note of Washington's plans for
the future, the actual steps taken to undermine the central elements
of the peace agreements passed in virtual silence, in accord with the
principle that the United States is entitled to employ violence as it
chooses. The same basic principle explains the elite consensus,
including the most outspoken doves, that Nicaragua must not be
permitted to obtain aircraft to defend its territory. The pretense of
liberal Congressmen and others that such aircraft would be a threat to
the United States may be dismissed with no comment. The real intent is
obvious: the terrorist superpower must be free to penetrate Nicaraguan
airspace at will for surveillance and coordination of the attacks on
"soft targets" by its proxy forces, and to provide them with arms and
supplies.

These crucial facts suffice to demonstrate that in terms of their
irrelevant substance, the accords were dead before the ink was dry,
with the full support of congressional liberals and elite opinion
generally.

Note that as tacitly conceded on all sides, the proxy forces bear
no resemblance to guerrillas. Rather, they are, by the standards of
the region, a well-equipped mercenary army maintained by overwhelming
U.S. power; their supporters insist that they would collapse if this
unlawful aid and control were to be withdrawn. The contrast to
authentic guerrillas, as in El Salvador, is dramatic, but suppressed,
in the interest of maintaining the Washington fiction of a "symmetry"
between Nicaragua and El Salvador. There is indeed a symmetry, though
not the one put forth by Washington and its Free Press. In both
countries, there is a terrorist army attacking "soft targets" and
slaughtering civilians, and in both countries, it is organized and
maintained by the United States: the army of El Salvador, and the
proxy army attacking Nicaragua from foreign bases. The symmetry
reaches to fine details. In El Salvador too, the U.S. mercenary forces
attack cooperatives, killing, raping and abducting members, as
Americas Watch has reported.12

Let us turn now to a secondary matter, the response of the
countries of the region. Honduras announced at once that it would not
observe the accords. The government refused to concede the existence
of contra camps within the country, and announced that no verification
would be permitted until Nicaragua satisfies Washington of its
compliance, by whatever standards the terrorist superpower chooses to
impose. Honduras refused to form even a token National Commission of
Reconciliation. After domestic protest, it finally did so two days
before the deadline, on November 3, but, as President Azcona
explained, the Commission "will not do anything" and will only serve
to "fulfill a requirement."13
Hence with regard to internal problems too, the accords are dead as
far as Honduras is concerned.

The accords call for establishment of "justice, freedom and
democracy" in the states of the region, and these are serious problems
in Honduras. The country is under effective military rule behind a
thin civilian facade, and as the U.S. moved to convert it into a
military base in the 1980s, human rights violations substantially
increased. Hundreds of thousands of peasants are starving to death in
the south while the country exports food. Thousands have been
forcefully expelled by the contras from the areas where the government
denies their existence. The head of the Christian Democratic Party
reports that "there is institutional torture, there are more than 150
disappeared people, there are assassinations and exiles, and capital
punishment is legal, as can be seen by assassinations carried out by
the state." Thousands of peasants, unemployed people, and common
criminals have been imprisoned for years without trial. Much of the
state terror is traceable to a CIA-trained elite battalion, a standard
pattern. The leader of a peasant organization, one of 14 suspected
"subversives" arrested by the police in October, stated that he was
tortured to force him to confess links to guerrillas. Police and
soldiers arrested, tortured and killed students and peasants in a
series of October actions. Ramon Custodio, president of the Commission
for the Defense of Human Rights in Central America and of the Honduran
Human Rights Commission, stated in late October that killings by the
security forces are becoming "more blatant," citing the murder of a
trade union leader, unarmed young men, and 30 criminals, and adding
that "political prisoners are not given the chance to be taken alive."
As the first three-month phase of the accords ended, he stated at an
international press conference (reported in the Mexican press) that
the human rights situation had become worse in Honduras since 1985:
"Before there was talk of disappearances and torture; now they simply
kill...." including army deserters, who are killed when captured. He
added that the human rights situations "have deteriorated" in
Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras since the accords were signed, so
that "the little hope there is that human rights will improve in the
region is steadily decreasing."14

Such continuing atrocities, and the refusal of the government to
undertake the steps required by the accords, pass without comment in
the Free Press, which also fails to note that the accords stress the
need to overcome "profound divisions" within each society and that the
mechanisms proposed are aimed at establishing "justice" as well as
meaningful democracy, not merely empty forms designed to ensure
the funding of repression by a compliant Congress that pretends not to
see.

In the terror states, Guatemala and El Salvador, the question of
compliance with the accords can scarcely be raised, and no one is
raising it. Consider freedom of the press. We hear a great deal about
La Prensa, including many fabrications, for example, that
this is the journal that courageously opposed Somoza; in fact, when
the owners made clear their commitment to the old order of privilege
and exploitation, the editor left with 80% of the staff to form
El Nuevo Diario, which can fairly claim to be the successor to
La Prensa, if a newspaper is defined in terms of its
editor and staff, not its owners and plant. La Prensa was
suspended by the government the day after the U.S. effectively
declared war on Nicaragua, in the terms used by elated Reagan
administration officials as the Democrat-controlled House passed the
contra aid bill. La Prensa was funded by the terrorist
superpower attacking Nicaragua, and the journal supported this attack.
The fact that it had been allowed to publish at all has few if any
precedents. Now it is publishing again, still supporting the war
against Nicaragua while the superpower conducting the war provides it
with "essential" funding according to its director, contra supporter
Jaime Chamorro; again, an unprecedented phenomenon. We should also
bear in mind the unreported fact that in much of Nicaragua, radio and
television are dominated by the United States and its client states,
demonizing the Sandinistas in the manner that has been so effective at
home and inducing people in areas where this is the prime
"information" source to "dread the Sandinistas as if they were the
devil incarnate," as Joe Eldridge reports in a study of Nicaraguan
refugees in Honduras.15
One should not underestimate the means available to a terrorist
superpower that operates with few domestic constraints.

Let us turn now to freedom of the press in Washington's terror
states. In El Salvador there was once an independent press: La
Cronica and El Independiente. They were not funded
by a superpower attacking El Salvador, and they were not censored.
Rather, one paper was closed when army tanks surrounded its offices
after a series of attacks including the machine-gunning of a
14-year-old newsboy and bombing and assassination attempts that drove
the editor out of the country; the other was closed when the security
forces seized the editor and an associate, disembowelled them with
machetes, and shot them. Is anyone calling for the reopening of
La Cronica and El Independiente? Of course not,
for two good and sufficient reasons: (1) Washington has commanded us
to focus on La Prensa and Nicaragua, where nothing
remotely comparable has happened, and being loyal cowards, we
naturally obey; (2) the idea of opening an independent press in El
Salvador is absurd. It would be necessary to send in an international
army to deter the U.S.-run security forces and prevent the murder of
the staff, if such media ever approached the condition that according
to U.S. law justifies state control over speech: that is, if they
posed a "clear and present danger," namely, to the system of privilege
maintained by U.S. violence.

Accordingly, we do not speak of freedom of press in El Salvador. Or
in Guatemala, where there has also been no censorship, and no
reporting of such trivialities as the slaughter of tens of thousands
of people in the past decade. The reason for the oversight is that
some 50 journalists were murdered by the security forces, some in
spectacular fashion. There is therefore no need for censorship, which
we abhor.

Meanwhile U.S. government propaganda relayed by the media as "news"
assures us that Duarte "gave the rebels free access to the press" (New
York Times Central America correspondent James LeMoyne)16;
technically true, since no law bars such access, only the workings of
the market supplemented by state terror.

The real attitudes of U.S. elites towards freedom of the press are
revealed further by the response to events elsewhere during the same
period. In the Philippines, the government closed three radio stations
and threatened others on October 7, accusing them of "glorifying the
enemies of the Government and openly defying the Government of
President Aquino by continuously transmitting the propaganda of
right-wing rebel groups and other enemies of the state." This
"crackdown on the media" was reported, but without comment, along with
the outlawing of the opposition (Communist) party that had been
legalized by the Marcos dictatorship, police raids against "suspected
communists," and government authorization of vigilante groups -- that
is, death squads.17
There were no calls for organizing a "democratic resistance" to
overthrow this "totalitarian" state, though they would be heard
quickly enough if Aquino were to undertake measures of social reform
and democratization that would threaten the interests of U.S.
corporations or the U.S. bases.

The major U.S. client state, which is endlessly lauded as a stellar
democracy, provides even more dramatic insight into the real
principles that animate those who courageously condemn Nicaraguan
"totalitarianism." Shortly after La Prensa was suspended,
Israel permanently closed two Jerusalem newspapers on the grounds that
"although we offer them freedom of expression...it is forbidden to
permit them to exploit this freedom in order to harm the State of
Israel." The closure was upheld by the High Court on the grounds that
"It is inconceivable that the State of Israel should allow terrorist
organizations which seek to destroy it to set up businesses in its
territory, legitimate as they may be"; the government had accused
these two Arab newspapers of receiving support from hostile groups. To
my knowledge, the only mention of these facts in a daily newspaper was
in a letter of mine in the Boston Globe. As La
Prensa was reopened, Israel closed a Nazareth political
journal, alleging that it supports the PLO, and shut down an
Arab-owned news office in Nablus on a similar charge, all "legal"
under the state of emergency that has been in force since 1948.18
None of this was reported here; New York Times
correspondent Thomas Friedman chose the day of the closing of the
Nablus office to produce one of his regular odes to freedom of
expression in Israel.19
Similarly, the destruction of the independent press in El Salvador
never merited an editorial comment in the Times, along
with numerous other atrocities, even the assassination of the
Archbishop with the apparent complicity of the security forces.

The libertarian passions of U.S. elites are very precisely focused,
much as in the case of other commissars, who condemn abuses in U.S.
domains while lauding the progress towards freedom in the "peoples'
democracies."

In other respects as well, the terror states cannot comply with the
accords as long as the U.S.-backed security forces remain in command,
tolerating the civilian facade as long as it can extort money from the
U.S. Congress, much of it a bribe to the wealthy that flows back to
U.S. banks. Consider the National Commissions of Reconciliation called
for by the accords. In Nicaragua, the Commission, formed in August, is
headed by Cardinal Obando, the most vocal and prominent critic of the
regime. In El Salvador it is headed by Alvaro Maga?a [accented
character did not scan -- JBE.], the conservative banker who was the
U.S. candidate for president in 1982, therefore president, and was
virtually limited to the right wing. This does not even approach the
level of black humor, which is perhaps why it is passed over in
silence, just as the outright refusal of Honduras to appoint even a
farcical Commission was not reported in the New York Times
for 5 weeks, and its subsequent fate, barely noted.20
In Guatemala, the Archbishop, an outspoken defender of human rights,
was not even nominated by the Church, no doubt by prearrangement with
the military-run government.

In both of the terror states, the security forces maintain
obedience by violence. According to the Church human rights office
Tutela Legal, in El Salvador "death squad killings jumped from an
average of four to five per month during the first part of this year
to around 10 per month in September and October," higher still in
November.21
Chris Norton, the only U.S. journalist reporting regularly from El
Salvador, observes (abroad) that the real numbers are unknown because
most death squad killings "have taken place in rural areas and few of
them have been reported." Amadeo Ramos, one of the founders of the
Indian Association ANIS, reports that an Indian settlement was bombed
by the army and "the bodies of several Indians were found in a remote
area thrown in a ditch" in mid-November.22
To mention a few cases in San Salvador itself, two activists of the
Mothers of the Disappeared (CoMadres) were abducted by Treasury police
on September 3, two days after the head of the University of El
Salvador Employees Union was kidnapped by heavily armed men. In
another case, which was actually reported here, the president of the
Human Rights Commission, Herbert Anaya, was murdered while taking his
children to school. A former president, Marianela Garcia Villas, had
been killed by security forces on the pretext that she was a
guerrilla, and other members had been murdered or "disappeared" by the
security forces. Anaya had been arrested and tortured by the Treasury
police in May 1986, along with other Commission members. While in
prison, they continued their work, compiling a 160-page report of
testimony of over 430 political prisoners, who gave details of their
torture, in one case, electrical torture by a North American major in
uniform. This report, one of the most explicit and comprehensive in
existence for any country, was smuggled out of the prison, along with
a videotape of testimony, and distributed to the U.S. media, which had
no interest in material so lacking in ideological serviceability.
After Anaya was released in a prisoner exchange, he was repeatedly
denounced by the government and threatened, also informed that he
headed a list of Commission workers to be killed. Lacking the
protection that might have been afforded by some media visibility
here, he was killed, probably by death squads associated with the
security forces, as indicated by Archbishop Rivera y Damas in an
unreported statement.23

As in the past, labor activists are a primary target. In violation
of congressional legislation, the U.S. Trade Representative rejected
an Americas Watch petition to review El Salvador "solely on the
grounds that it is appropriate for the Salvadoran armed forces to
arrest, interrogate, and imprison trade unionists whom the Department
of State considers to be opponents of the Duarte Government" (Americas
Watch). The petition cited numerous examples of state terror directed
against the labor movement, a matter of no interest here. As in the
case of freedom of press, concern over labor rights is precisely
focused among U.S. elites: Poland and Nicaragua, but not the client
states such as El Salvador and Israel, where the "socialist" trade
union is in the forefront of the denial of minimal rights to the
Palestinian workers who provide cheap labor under abysmal conditions.24

The severe violations of the accords by Duarte's security forces
and the lethal network associated with them pass with little comment
in a terrorist culture, where the Free Press assures us that President
Duarte "has gone considerably further [than the Sandinistas] in
carrying out the letter of the treaty" though perhaps he too is not
"particularly committed to its spirit of reconciliation," since he "is
trying to split the leftist rebel alliance" -- nothing more (James
LeMoyne).25

The official story throughout has been that Duarte represents the
"moderate center," unable to control the "violence by both
ultrarightists and by the Marxist guerrillas" (James LeMoyne)26;
an accompanying photo shows New York Mayor Koch being greeted by the
Defense Minister, General Vides Casanova, who presided over the
slaughter of some 60,000 people, in accord with his doctrine that "the
armed forces are prepared to kill 200,000-300,000, if that's what it
takes to stop a Communist takeover." In the irrelevant world of fact,
as the Times has occasionally conceded in the small
print, the violence has overwhelmingly been traceable to the security
forces. A Times editorial noted the Anaya assassination
-- as a proof of Duarte's "courage" in "defying" the death squads for
which he has long served as a fig leaf. This reaction demonstrates
that there are no limits to tolerance of virtuous atrocities. Buried
in a news story, the same day, is the fact that the killers were using
sophisticated weapons available only to the "right-wing death squads"
-- that is, the assassination squads of Duarte's security forces, as
Times editors and correspondents know, but will not say.27
Meanwhile President Duarte, in his usual manner, blamed the left for
the assassination, just as he has regularly blamed the victims for
their torture and murder by the security forces that he praises for
their "valiant services," from the moment that he took over the role
of "bag man" for the military, in the appropriate phrase of the
Council on Hemispheric Affairs -- or as the media prefer, the role of
"centrist-leftist" (James LeMoyne),28
valiantly crusading for democracy and social justice.

Expressing its utter contempt for the Guatemala accords, the Duarte
government passed an amnesty lauded by the New York Times
as its "most concrete step toward complying with the regional peace
accord" since Duarte has now "released almost all political
prisoners," a step contrasted with the refusal of the Sandinistas to
comply apart from "tentative" and grudging steps.29
The amnesty, bitterly opposed by human rights groups, labor and the
church, eliminated the remote possibility of any punishment for the
murderers and torturers who conducted the terror that demolished the
popular organizations, destroyed the independent media, wiped out the
political opposition, killed thousands of union activists, and
effectively traumatized the population in the U.S. crusade to
eliminate the threat of democracy and social reform. In Canada's
leading journal, it is described as "an amnesty for the military and
the death squads" in an article headlined "Duarte ceasefire designed
to fail, diplomats say"30;
in Canada the Party Line is more difficult to enforce. As for the
incidental release of hundreds of political prisoners, the chief of
staff of Costa Rica's Foreign Ministry, Luis Solis, observed that the
amnesty would put them at the mercy of the death squads, who are
"probably hiring people to go out and shoot at the ones who are going
to be released," quite secure that they will be protected for their
crimes. The Washington Post notes in passing that "90
percent of the approximately 1,000 political prisoners in El Salvador
had been in custody for more than four years without a trial," and
that many fear their release to the mercy of the death squads.31
The Guatemalan military had declared a similar amnesty, for
themselves, as they permitted a civilian government to operate under
their control so as to obtain U.S. funds to rescue the country from
the economic chaos they had created while conducting mass slaughter
with enthusiastic U.S. support.

Meanwhile moralists here ponder the dilemmas of the "moderate
center" concocted for their benefit by the State Department Office of
Public Diplomacy, which has the task of controlling what high Reagan
administration officials describe as "enemy territory," that is, the
domestic population.

To appreciate just how extreme was the Salvadoran gesture of
contempt for the accords, we can return to the irrelevant facts. The
accords call for amnesty decrees "setting out all the steps to
guarantee the inviolability of all forms of life and liberty, material
goods and the safety of the people to benefit from said decrees" --
exactly what is declared unthinkable by the Duarte government as it
declares amnesty for the killers and torturers to the admiring
applause of the Free Press.

While in the United States, Duarte is lauded for courageously
leading El Salvador to "democracy," the reaction at home is different.
Public opinion polls conducted by the Central America University in El
Salvador in early 1987 reveal that half the population "think that
nothing has changed" under Duarte, 18% think that the situation has
deteriorated, and a rousing 10% agree with the U.S. media that "there
is a process of democracy and freedom in the country at present." On a
visit to Holland in October 1987, Duarte was criticized for human
rights abuses while officials privately expressed unhappiness about
the visit, taken at his initiative.32
In Latin America, the reaction is harsher. On a trip to Uruguay,
Argentina and Brazil, Duarte was bitterly denounced by Christian
Democratic leaders and others and refused permission to address the
General Assembly in Uruguay, while in Argentina half the delegates
left the chamber as he spoke and in Brazil, fewer than 10% of the
members attended and he was greeted with angry demonstrations and
accusations of being a genocidal murderer. In the Free Press, one will
find little mention of how our hero is perceived in countries that
have had some experience with U.S.-backed killers.

In the second of the terror states, the situation is hardly
different. Americas Watch reports 25 new "disappearances" and
kidnappings in August 1987, in addition to 74 killings reported in the
press, an unknown number being political assassinations. The
Guatemalan Human Rights Commission, based in Mexico for obvious
reasons, reported 572 extrajudicial executions and 142
"disappearances" from mid-January to March 1987. Other sources
estimate about 50 political assassinations a month in 1987. Nineth de
Garcia, Guatemala's leading human rights activist, reported in late
November, for the benefit of the Canadian reader, that "the level of
political kidnapping and murder is on the increase" since the accords
were signed.33
As in El Salvador and Honduras, the poor are press-ganged into
military service while the rich are exempt, and general poverty and
misery mount while the wealthy enjoy the benefits of efficient state
terror. In all three countries, the military remain firmly in command,
serving the interests of U.S. investors, the local oligarchy, and in
El Salvador, the new elites who are riding Duarte's coattails for
their share in corruption and robbery. In short, "democracy,"
American-style.

The rule of the military in the U.S.-backed terror states is
illustrated by their complete immunity from prosecution for crimes
that merit comparison to Pol Pot. All of this is acceptable, even
described as "democracy," in the terrorist superpower that has
directed and supported the necessary purge of the societies. Honduras
differs primarily in that the repression has been less bloody, or to
be more accurate, more indirect: starvation and slow, cruel death
rather than torture, rape, murder and mutilation. I put aside Costa
Rica, also now dependent on U.S. aid for survival, though a serious
inquiry into the provisions of the accord for "justice, freedom and
democracy" and access by "all ideological groups" to the media (a
virtual monopoly of the ultra-right) would reveal that their terms are
far from realized here, despite much sanctimonious rhetoric.

The conclusion, then, is that in the U.S. client states of
Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala, there is no possibility that the
accords will be implemented. The Guatemalan Central America
Report observes that "of the five Central American countries,
the Nicaraguans have by far done the most to meet the requirements of
the Guatemala Plan, and in some cases have made conciliatory gestures
not indicated in the plan," citing examples.34
Here, no one discusses the matter, because all of this is off the
agenda according to Washington orders, along with the even more
serious U.S. actions to undermine the accords. From the first days
after the accords were signed, the media assured us that whatever may
appear in the irrelevant text, "there is no doubt that [the treaty's]
main provisions are principally directed at Nicaragua and will affect
Nicaragua more than any of the other nations that signed the accord"
-- which is certainly true, under the conditions of obedience dictated
by Washington, though this was presumably not the point intended by
James LeMoyne. As he explained further, the Sandinistas are "in a
somewhat exposed position" because they, and they alone, "are under
close scrutiny for their efforts to carry out the Central American
peace treaty" -- as dictated by Washington, whose orders are naturally
binding.35Times correspondent Stephen Kinzer informed us that the
peace accord "requires Nicaragua to permit full press and political
freedom" while requiring "other countries in the region to stop
supporting" the contras; a half-truth that amounts to a lie, since the
accord also requires the other states to permit full press and
political freedom, which is inconceivable as long as the security
forces are not dismantled and the U.S. remains in command.

I do not mean to suggest that Kinzer is incapable of outright
falsehoods, for example, his statement in the same column that the
Nicaraguan government refused to allow the "Roman Catholic radio
station to broadcast news." This is one of his favorite tales,
repeated in several other columns and by LeMoyne as well,36
along with the claim that the Ministry of Interior refused to comment
on the matter (Oct. 20). AP reported the same day the statement of the
Interior Ministry that "Radio Catolica may broadcast news, but must
apply for the legally required permission for the program and register
the name of its director, the broadcast time and other information" --
not exactly a decisive proof that this is a totalitarian dungeon.

These and other commentators surely understand that even if
Nicaragua is willing to overlook the fact that by orders from
Washington, the terms of the accord are inapplicable to the U.S.
client states, as of course to itself, still Nicaragua can hardly
relax its guard as long as the U.S. persists in its outspoken
commitment to overthrow the government by violence. Perhaps it is for
this reason that the Times does not report such matters
as CIA-run supply flights to the proxy army, the attempts to bribe
Miskito Indian leaders, or Operation "Blazing Trail 1987" and other
U.S. measures to ensure that Nicaragua will be compelled to maintain a
state of permanent mobilization against the threat of outright U.S.
invasion. In the West, threatening military maneuvers are regarded as
tantamount to aggression, justifying a pre-emptive strike in response.
Thus when Arab armies deployed in May 1967, the Israeli attack in
response was considered quite legitimate: how can Israel be expected
to sustain a mobilization for more than a few days? Israel was not an
impoverished country under attack by a terrorist superpower, but when
the U.S. carries out regular military maneuvers on Nicaragua's borders
along with overflights, naval operations nearby, even the deployment
of 50,000 troops designed to draw the army away from population
defense so as to facilitate the attack against "soft targets" by
U.S.-run terrorists, there is not a word of protest in elite circles
-- apart from protest over Nicaragua's unconscionable attempt to arm
itself in self-defense. These facts too provide us with some insight
into our political culture.

Let us put aside any further discussion of the irrelevant facts and
turn to the world of illusion constructed by Washington. That is, we
now turn to the Orwellian version of the accords -- the operative
version, given the realities of power.

The Operative Illusions

According to the U.S. version, the sole question is whether the
accords will be implemented by Nicaragua -- according to the standards
set by Washington. These standards were readily predictable from the
start. Since Washington is determined to undermine the agreements, any
respect in which Nicaragua adheres to them is off the agenda. We are
permitted to discuss some element of the accords only if Washington's
interpretation differs from Nicaragua's, so that Nicaragua is in
violation -- by definition. The task of the media, then, is to conduct
a parody of the sciences. In the sciences, one confronts some puzzling
facts and attempts to devise principles that will explain them. In
ideological warfare, one begins with Higher Truths dictated from
above. The task is to select the facts, or to invent them, in such a
way as to render the required conclusions not too transparently absurd
-- at least for properly disciplined minds.

Accordingly the media, and respectable opinion generally, quickly
reduced the Central American agreements to "two key points," as
Stephen Kinzer explained: (1) Will Nicaragua agree to negotiate with
the contras -- that is, with the civilian directorate established by
the CIA as a classic Communist-style front? (2) Will Nicaragua offer
an amnesty to what are called "political prisoners," including
National Guardsmen arrested -- but not killed, as is the norm
elsewhere under such circumstances -- after they had taken part in the
slaughter of some 40,000 people?

The accords say nothing about these matters, but that is further
irrelevant fact. Specifically, the accords do not call for discussions
with CIA-created front organizations. That the contra directorate is
exactly that has long been known, and has recently been documented in
detail in a monograph by Edgar Chamorro, who was selected by the CIA
to serve as spokesman for the front created as part of the
disinformation campaign designed by the State Department for "enemy
territory" at home (Packaging the Contras, Institute for
Media Analysis). Robert Owen, Oliver North's liaison with the contras,
described the civilian front as "a name only," "a creation of the
United States government (USG) to garner support from Congress"; power
lies in the hands of the Somozist-run FDN headed by Adolfo Calero, who
"is a creation of the USG and so he is the horse we chose to ride,"
though he is surrounded by people who are "liars and greed- and
power-motivated" for whom the war is "a business" as they hope for the
marines to restore them to the power they lost.37
Washington, with the docile media in tow, focuses on the issue of
negotiations with its creation as part of the effort to establish the
fiction that the proxy army is an indigenous guerrilla force,
comparable to the guerrillas in El Salvador who were driven to the
hills by U.S.-backed state terror, have always fought within their
country, receive little if any military aid from abroad, have nothing
like the extraordinary intelligence and support system provided by the
terrorist superpower, and face a military force far more powerful than
the army of Nicaragua. Notice further that negotiation of a cease-fire
with authentic guerrilla forces is hardly likely to succeed, as the
show negotiations in El Salvador and Guatemala illustrate, and in the
case of Washington's proxies, the U.S. can readily disrupt any
progress. The issue, then, is marginal, as compared with such crucial
matters as Washington's unlawful use of force and state terror in the
client states. But naturally Washington will seek to restrict
attention to this issue, and commentary here has obeyed, including the
doves.

As for amnesty, as we have seen, El Salvador acted at once to
violate this directive in the most blatant fashion, as Guatemala had
already done when the military declared amnesty for itself. Nicaragua
had an amnesty decree that approximates the stated conditions of the
accord, apart from the state of siege, which Nicaragua has announced
will remain in force until the U.S. war is brought to a halt, a
position that we would accept as legitimate in the case of any client
state, or the United States itself if it were under attack or threat.
It was also accepted as legitimate by the Verification Commission made
up of the foreign ministers of 13 Latin American nations including the
five Central American countries. In their November 8 report, they
agreed that Nicaragua's amnesty may legitimately remain conditional on
termination of aid to the contras and use of foreign territory to
attack Nicaragua. A senior Latin American diplomat commented:
"Nicaragua does not have to implement amnesty until Honduras kicks out
the contras and the Americans stop helping them." Rephrasing the facts
in official Times Newspeak: under the provisions of the
accords, "no country in the region would be permitted to assist the
contras once the Sandinistas establish full political freedom"
(Stephen Kinzer).38

The accords charge the Verification Commission with the
responsibility "to verify and monitor the commitments contained in
this document." But this is unacceptable to Washington, because the
Commission is less subject to U.S. influence than the Central American
client states, who therefore must be assigned the role of monitors.
For the same reason, a Contadora agreement was completely unacceptable
to Washington, whereas a Central American agreement could barely be
tolerated. The more fanatic contra lobbyists go so far as to inform us
that the devious Ortega "tipped his hand" at the OAS when he said that
"it is up to the International Verification and Monitoring
Commission...to determine who is complying with the Guatemala
accords," exactly as the text says, instead of the Central American
presidents, as Washington would prefer given its power over them
(Robert Leiken); note how brazenly Ortega defies Washington orders.
More subtle apologists report that "the decision" over "the accord's
fate" lies in the hands of "the two superpowers" and their respective
clients, thus adopting the framework of cold war confrontation
demanded by Washington (James LeMoyne).39

The Nicaraguan amnesty was extended after the accords, including
about 1000 prisoners, but few National Guardsmen. The press, following
Washington directives, speaks of eight to ten thousand "political
prisoners," but Americas Watch, in a detailed review, demonstrates
that the figures are largely fabricated, and that these are not
"political prisoners" in the sense used in the West; its February 1987
report lists two political prisoners in this sense, one since
released. Reviewing the records of the Red Cross, Amnesty
International, and its own investigations, Americas Watch estimated
that apart from common criminals (including 600 members of the army
and police sentenced for crimes against the population, a possibility
unimaginable in the terror states), the prisons contained about 2200
National Guardsmen and 1500 people charged with security-related
crimes. The report is worth reading for its critical assessment of
these matters, but that is the real world, not the Orwellian world of
Washington and its minions.

In the latter world, along with numerous other fantasies, Robert
Leiken states that "figures on Nicaraguan political prisoners...range
from a low of 4,300 (Americas Watch and the Nicaraguan government)" to
the much higher claims that he has relayed.40
Putting aside the interesting reading of the Americas Watch report,
note the none-too-subtle juxtaposition of Americas Watch and the
Nicaraguan government, in obedience to Washington's longstanding
attempts to undermine authentic human rights organizations.

The New York Times review of the progress of the
accords after the "historic deadline" of November 741
conforms precisely to the dictates of the Office of Public Diplomacy.
In the survey article of November 8 by James LeMoyne, the behavior of
the United States is unmentioned and nothing is said about its client
states. The article focuses on one issue: the Sandinista decision to
enter negotiations with the CIA civilian front, with Cardinal Obando
-- their most prominent antagonist -- as intermediary; a remarkable
choice, since only a neutral party is considered an appropriate
"intermediary" apart from the Orwellian world established by reigning
power, and a hazardous move, since Obando can be expected to blame the
Sandinistas if the negotations collapse, as elsewhere. This decision,
LeMoyne explains, is a great victory for the United States, because
its creation thus gains the status of "a legitimate belligerent
force." The implication, drawn explicitly by administration officials
the same day, is that "we've learned from this...that pressure works,
and that we must keep that pressure on."42
The truth of the matter is that pressure works to keep the media in
line, though this victory is only a shade less difficult than the
glorious conquest of Grenada.

Accompanying LeMoyne's agitprop is a photograph of a rally in
Managua with this caption: "Nicaraguans cheering President Daniel
Ortega Saavedra as he announced that his Sandinista Government would
agree to indirect negotiations with the contras on a cease-fire." The
reader is to understand, then, that the people of Nicaragua are
overjoyed over this contra victory, in accord with Times
doctrine. In the forefront of the photo is a cheering woman wearing an
FSLN (Sandinista) T-shirt. There are three signs visible. One states
that "the others should comply," since Nicaragua had already complied
with the accords. A second reads: "Popular power cannot be discussed
after 26 years of [the people's] struggle," a familiar Sandinista
slogan. The third, not entirely readable, apparently calls for closing
of La Prensa. Not precisely what the Times
is laboring to convey.43

It would be an error to describe such media subservience as
totalitarianism in the Stalinist or Nazi style. In totalitarian
states, those who serve power have the excuse of fear. Here we see,
rather, a form of voluntary servitude, a remarkable and pervasive
feature of the intellectual culture.

For its first commentary on the initial three-month phase of the
accords, the Times selected James Chace, a noted dove.
Accordingly, he expressed pleasure with the progress on all fronts,
even Nicaragua, where President Ortega "has agreed to negotiate
indirectly with the contras," thus indicating that at last "the
Sandinistas seem determined to fulfill the main provisions" of the
agreement, as defined by Washington. But "there is still, of course, a
long way to go" in consummating the accords, because "the Sandinistas
have not yet declared a general amnesty or lifted the state of
emergency." Apart from continued Sandinista obstruction, Chace sees no
problems during the three-month period, though as a dove, he opposes
renewed contra aid and criticizes the Reagan administration for
remaining "suspicious and hostile," while conceding that it has good
grounds, since "the Guatemala agreement does not provide for
reductions in Soviet aid to Managua" so that "America's legitimate
security concerns" are not addressed. Among the topics unmentioned
are: U.S. actions to undermine the accords; the violation of their
essential provisions by the U.S. client states; the fact that "Soviet
aid to Managua" was a major achievement of the Reagan administration,
which blocked aid from elsewhere while launching an attack on
Nicaragua, and that the Guatemala agreement also does not provide for
reductions in U.S. aid to its client states; that others, besides the
beleaguered and helpless United States, have "legitimate security
concerns," among them Nicaragua and the victims of U.S. aid in the
terror states; that Managua has long offered to exclude foreign
advisers and negotiate verifiable security guarantees, efforts
successfully blocked by Washington; that if Nicaragua poses "security
concerns" for the United States, then Luxembourg poses security
concerns for the Soviet Union, and Denmark, a member of a hostile
military alliance, poses far greater concerns, so that the USSR is
entitled, by our principles, to organize terrorist forces to attack
and overthrow their governments unless they agree to disarm and offer
verifiable guarantees that they will no longer threaten the Soviet
Union. In short, the very model of a well-behaved dove, as designed by
the Office of Public Diplomacy.44

As always, it is the duty of the liberal doves to set the limits of
thinkable thought. This has always been the essence of the American
system of indoctrination, brilliantly effective among the educated
classes, though "enemy territory" remains out of control, a continuing
problem.

Putting irrelevant fact aside, the operative question today is
whether Washington can convert the "key issues" it designates into a
justification for expanding the war against Nicaragua. The problem
that arose after Nicaragua's offer to negotiate with the CIA civilian
front can surely be overcome by U.S. propaganda and military
operations. As we have seen, the latter were immediately escalated in
accord with the dedication of the terrorist superpower to the unlawful
use of force, with the compliance of the doves, who loyally evade this
unwelcome issue. Washington has also attempted in other ways to elicit
a hostile Nicaraguan response that might be utilized by the State
Department Office of Public Diplomacy in its struggles in "enemy
territory" at home. The Reagan administration sent Secretary of
Education William Bennett, Jeane Kirkpatrick, and assorted contra
supporters (David Horowitz, Ronald Radosh, etc.) to Nicaragua, where
they delivered inflammatory public addresses denouncing the
Sandinistas and praising the U.S. proxy army attacking Nicaragua,
prominently reported in the press (with approval, in La Prensa).
But unfortunately, these efforts elicited no reaction that could be
exploited for propaganda purposes.

We might, incidentally, ask what would happen if a Libyan official
or Qaddafi enthusiast were to arrive in Tel Aviv to deliver a public
address praising Abu Nidal. Or suppose a Japanese cabinet minister had
landed in Washington in 1942 (when the national territory was not
under attack or even threat -- in fact, it had not been threatened
since the War of 1812) to deliver diatribes about American racism and
injustice and to call for the forceful overthrow of the government by
the "freedom fighters" then liberating the Philippines and other
Western colonies. We need not speculate, since as distinct from
totalitarian Nicaragua, Israel and the United States would never
tolerate any such act for one instant. In fact, the U.S. has barred
even anti-Sandinista Nicaraguan legislators who are opposed to contra
aid, mothers tortured by Duarte's security services who were invited
by NOW to speak in New England towns, a delegate from the Salvadoran
Human Rights Commission to a UN session on disarmament and development
that the U.S. boycotted, among many others -- for example, the
Canadian publisher of several of my books, still barred from our
sacred soil because he opposed U.S. aggression in Indochina. All such
matters are off the agenda, and in our extraordinary imperial
arrogance, we take for granted that Nicaragua must tolerate the
infantile antics and vulgar abuse that are a Washington specialty, in
a manner that no other state would endure -- surely not the U.S. or
its allies.

The attack against Nicaragua and the programs of state terror to
suppress democracy and social reform in the client states reflect an
elite consensus. That is why they are not discussed in any minimally
serious way. The media will not expose what they know to be true, and
Congress will not constrain the terrorist commanders as long as they
seem to be succeeding in their tasks. The fate of the Central American
accords lies in the hands of the domestic enemy of the state, the
citizens in "enemy territory" at home. As so often in the past,
dissent, protest, pressures of a wide variety that escape elite
control can modify the calculus of costs of planners, and offer a
slight hope that Washington can be compelled to permit at least some
steps towards "justice, freedom and democracy" within its domains.

Notes

1 For
discussion of the background, and references not cited here, see my
Culture of Terrorism (South End, 1988).

5 Neil Lewis,
NYT, Nov. 12, 1987. See AP and Pamela Constable,
BG, same day, stating the facts correctly. Constable also cites
the World Court condemnation of the U.S. for unlawful use of force and
violation of treaties in the following sanitized version: the Court
"found that the Sandinista government's doctrines did not constitute
an international threat and did not justify US military intervention."

23 AP, Nov.
15, 1987, reporting the Archbishop's homily at the Metropolitan
Cathedral where he "said the Legal Office [Tutela Legal] had
information a death squad was responsible," citing also other death
squad killings.

40New
Republic, Dec. 14. Among other examples, we might note Leiken's
triumphant claim that "the contras released their Sandinista
prisoners," referring to the release of 80 "Nicaraguan prisoners of
war" on September 18, also hailed by the Free Press, which reported
happily that most chose to stay in Costa Rica. In Central America,
however, "the speculation is that they may be disaffected contras or
contras who would rather be inside Costa Rica by November 7" (Central
America Report, Guatemala City, Sept. 26); "The symbolism of
the gesture was tainted somewhat after several of the prisoners
admitted to being contras and others said they had been denounced as
Sandinista infiltrators in the contra ranks and were arrested" (Mesoamerica,
San Jose, Costa Rica), Oct. 1987.

43 Peter
Ford reports from Managua that "the tens of thousands of Sandinista
supporters in Revolution square offered no response when the President
announced...talks with the contra leadership," and other steps highly
touted here were "met with a baffled silence," though his defiant
challenge to "aggression against the Nicaraguan people" received
"enthusiastic applause"; CSM, Nov. 9, 1987.